


Three Blackbirds

by elmathelas



Category: Lord of the Rings RPF
Genre: M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-06-28
Updated: 2013-06-28
Packaged: 2017-12-16 09:41:37
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,374
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/860685
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/elmathelas/pseuds/elmathelas
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Billy and Dom are together for years.  At various times, it seems like magic might be real.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Three Blackbirds

**Author's Note:**

> Beta by Pippinmctaggart. Originally posted to Livejournal 4/26/2004

Dom licked the side of his thumb, catching the juice from the last strawberry, and looked up at the sky. The day had started fine, but a brisk wind had brought in a heavy cloud cover, low and gray, gaps in the lowest layer showing that the ones above were still being shifted into place by the wind.

“Funny day for a picnic.” Billy folded the blanket over his arm while Dom ran to the rubbish bin to toss in their trash. Their picnic had been purchased, mainly, from a small store near the park, where Dom had paid what he was reasonably sure was an outrageous price for Brie. Still, his French wasn’t what it once was, and he didn’t really mind. Spreading the wealth, and all that.

“It’s nice.” Dom returned and slipped his arm across Billy’s back, and looked up, tilting his head back until it was only the sky that filled his field of vision, the layers of cloud now seeming almost near enough to touch.

“Nice.” Billy’s tone might have started as wonder or a joke, but it was too soft to carry either, his voice fading as he tilted his head back too. “I keep thinking there’s something moving behind the clouds.”

“I know what you mean.” Dom didn’t squint, but tried to relax his eyes, to look through the layers, looking past the layer of mist and fog that filled in the gaps in the lowest layer. It felt like one of those optical illusions he could never see, the pattern floating off the page before the picture could reveal itself.

“Birds,” Billy said quietly, squinting a little. “I see wings.”

Dom took that clue, tried to work with it, like he would when someone would look over his shoulder at one of those books, whispering the answer to what the picture was, looked forward to rest his neck for a while. The park was emptying, people fleeing as rain looked imminent, but some of those who had stayed were standing in the same posture, staring, as if the clouds were hiding some secret.

Billy took his hand, slim fingers warm in the cool air. Lifting their hands together he pointed to a certain spot in the clouds, knowing that was the only way Dom could attune his attention to a certain point, like a child. “There,” he said quietly, “there’s a gap. Keep looking there.”

There were wings, as Billy had said. Seeing the curve of the pinions Dom had to adjust his idea of how large, how far away that gap in the clouds was, since the wing nearly took up the entire space. There were no trees, no ground, no Billy in his sight, and he lost sense of proportion and space as he watched for the wings, seeing them again and again, fairly flashing by that space, the feathers far more detailed in their shape and texture then he thought he could see at such a distance, as if they were both far away and being held almost too close to his eye to bear.

“What are they?” Dom asked.

“Keep looking.”

Dom looked out of the corner of his eye, as at a comet or a star, letting his peripheral vision see the light and dark instead of color, and saw shoulders, arms, faces.

“Are those…?” He silenced himself, as the image seemed to fade as soon as he spoke.

“Yes.”

Dom looked for only a moment more, the cramp in his neck painful to the point of making him look turn away, even from such a sight. And yet, it wasn’t as surprising as he thought it should be. The sensation in the pit of his stomach was the same as if he had come across some wild animal he’d only read about in books but never really doubted the existence of. Doubt had nothing to do with it. It was only a gratified confirmation. Looking away so soon made it no less real.

When he looked around it seemed that a few more people were looking up, yet none of them were gasping, or turning to each other with expressions of disbelief. Then again, neither he nor Billy had done those things. Billy let go of his hand, and Dom let it fall slowly to his side.

Billy took the basket. Dom carried the blanket.

In the car Dom leaned against the passenger seat, his neck still cramped.

“Billy.” He spoke quietly. “Did anyone else see?”

Billy shrugged as he started the engine. “I don’t know. Chances are they didn’t believe their own eyes.”

Dom thought of the strange illusion of the wings being too far away to see and yet rendered in such detail that they had to be close, closer even than his own body, and had no trouble imagining his mind rejecting it all. Yet, he had not.

“You believed it, right?” Dom had to ask.

“I did.” Billy continued to look straight ahead as he drove, but reached over, took Dom’s hand, brought it to his lips. “I do.”

In the lobby of their hotel people answered phones and spoke in low tones, never looking up as they walked through. Once back in their room they undressed in the dim light of the increasingly dark afternoon. The clouds were a solid layer now, not even the slightest hint of movement or light flickering above them. The elevator bell chimed in the corridor, the sound muffled by the walls.

Dom stood before the window, pulling the drape back just so, concealing himself while he looked up at the sky.

“The clouds are unnaturally thick,” Dom said quietly, only barely aware of Billy walking up behind him.

Billy placed his hand over Dom’s, leaving the drape open but to a lesser degree as he slipped his other arm around Dom’s middle, pulling him close. He spoke softly, his chin resting on Dom’s shoulder, digging in on some words. “The clouds conceal them. They’re on the move.” He let the curtain fall shut but didn’t pull it tight.

The mystery of why, a quiet feeling of mingled dread and hope, settled over them with a sensation that might have been mistaken for fatigue. They slept until morning, waking when a bright line of sunlight cut across their bed, the sky bright blue and clear.

 

Dom was kneeling on the very edge of the back seat, sweaty fingers fumbling the buckle as he tried to fasten the seatbelt through the plastic back of the rented car seat. Billy stood outside the car in the relatively cooler air, Chloe balanced on his hip.

“Remember when traveling was easy?” he asked, poking his face into the car.

Dom turned to him, all sweaty and red in the face, the damn buckle finally clasped. “Remember the angels?”

Billy crouched then, Chloe fairly glaring at the car seat. She spoke, her baby voice babbling something, but for once they spoke over her voice, or under it, low tones audible through her high voice.

“Aye. I do. What made you think of that?”

Dom tugged on the seat, crouched back between the two front seats, reached for his daughter. She eschewed his arms and stomped obstinately into the car, climbing into the seat herself. _Doesn’t take after you much does she?_ Dom usually asked when she was displaying such Scottish resolve, but he skipped it, answering Billy instead as he wiped his sweaty palms on his jeans. “Just traveling. And the day feels the same.” Chloe crossed her arms and stared at him defiantly while he fastened her lap belt.

Billy looked around as Dom contorted himself to return to the driver’s seat, backing up arse first into the front of the car, turning just so that when he sat his legs followed. The day was hot and bright, but with air that felt right against his skin, the sweat no more than was proper for spring in southern California. He got into the passenger seat, looking back at Chloe, who had abandoned her cross look for the sleepy one she usually still had in the car.

“It does feel like that,” Billy said, referring to that day of years ago without worry that Dom would know exactly what he meant.

The day passed, though, without angels. Perfect waves and sand, yes, and the good company of Sean and his family, his daughters and his wife, and Chloe on her little boogie board, so in love with the ocean though she’d only seen the Pacific this one time.

When it was nearly time to leave they stood outside of Sean’s summer home, the screen door making a satisfying thwap-bang as the older children ran back and forth; Billy and Dom were themselves reluctant to leave, as children might have been. Dom’s eyes were tired, his vision blurred around the edges as it always was after a day in the ocean, as if there was a film over his corneas, that clear window over the pupil perhaps abraded by the salt, or else his own tears had deserted him, leaving his eyes dry. He blinked as a tiny girl in a pink dress ran into him, leaning on his leg in her fatigue. He reached down and scooped her up, discovering only then that she was in fact Jane, Sean’s youngest girl, not his own.

“Well hello there.” She displayed none of the outgoing qualities of her older sister, but no fear of him either, simply burrowing her head on his shoulder. He was content to wait for Billy to return from the back yard with Chloe, holding her, as tired as she was perhaps but feeling the state known as “adult” that required him to remain standing. The blur from his eyes cast halos around the citronella torches, made faint lines radiate from the height of the flames. He played with the image while he waited, turning his head to see the trails left by his persistence of vision.

When Billy finally came walking around the corner of the house Sean followed him, carrying Chloe in his arms, her attitude on his shoulder similar to Sean’s own daughter. Dom smiled in silent acknowledgement of how dear their children were, so worn by the sun and air of the day, and when he looked at Sean it was if there were lines coming off from him too, thin shapes only a shade lighter than the dark they were held against, moving with him, unlike the trails of light that moved only with Dom’s eyes. He tilted his head but the strange new lines stayed the same, and seemed to dip and sway not only with Sean, but with him, with Billy, with their children. Sean handed Chloe to Billy, held his arms out for his own daughter almost the moment they were empty, and the lines between and around them began to look more like a web, tendrils escaping and fading as they sloped off their bodies to the back yard, to all points, disappearing to his sight around the dark edge of the yard and the bright circle of light from the nearby streetlamp. He blinked, shook his head only enough to move the fringe over his eyes, and caught Billy smiling at him as if they shared a secret.

Dom looked away from Billy as he handed Jane back to Sean, blinking, sure the lines were only tricks of the light, scratches on his eye, salt, but they changed when the children were handed back to their parents, glowing briefly along with a hum that was felt and not heard, the resonance like walking beneath high tension wires, but without the feeling of trespass that always brought him.

“It’s alright,” Billy said softly, and Dom only half wondered what he was referring to.

Sean seemed to think the words were meant for him, or Jane, patting her back as if she was a much younger baby. “We’ll all see each other again soon.”

“Wish it could have been for longer this time,” Dom said, and it did seem foolish, being in the same state but unable to wrangle more than one day with their friend.

Sean shrugged, leaning forward child and all, to hug him, then turned to Billy, their respective children nearly mirror images. When the four of them stepped close, the little girls reaching sleepily for each other as well, the lines that plagued his vision almost seemed to flare, leaving blue spots before his eyes.

Sean and Billy parted without any words save for the goodbyes of their daughters, and Billy turned to Dom again, not watching as Sean walked away, back to his family.

“It’s alright,” Billy repeated, then reached his hand forward, his fingers searching through the air as if for a string or a cobweb, found it, made a ‘come hither’ motion with his middle three fingers. The lines turned from blue to gold, the light still so subtle he would have missed it had his eyes not been clouded with salt and fatigue, straining, it seemed, against the people they touched. Sean paused as if to look back, then continued, the break in his stride the briefest of moments.

Billy’s smile looked sharp, teeth almost dangerous in the low light, small and precise as his hands. He straightened out his fingers, stepping away at the same moment, leaving Dom unsure of whether the darker spot in his vision was a negative of the white image of Billy’s hand, or something else altogether.

Back at their rented home Chloe settled easily, waking briefly, drifting back to sleep almost instantly, tucked under the blankets on the fold-out couch. When he returned to bed Billy found Dom lying face down in the pillows, his face turned only just enough to breathe. He turned up the air conditioner, laid one leg between Dom’s, arranging his arms to either side of Dom, lying his face between Dom’s shoulder blades. The thin cotton of the tee-shirt there did little to protect Dom from his stubble, and Billy held still, not wanting to scratch.

“Lightning.” Dom’s voice was muffled by the covers, but Billy understood the word.

“Just now?” he asked. The living room windows faced east, so if there was a storm moving in he wouldn’t have seen it.

Dom shook his head. “At the beach. Sean’s house. Some kind of lightning. St. Elmo’s fire. Static.”

Billy laughed quietly, sliding off to one side of Dom in order to pull him close.

“What was the other thing you asked me today?” he prompted. He pulled hard on Dom’s chest, arranging the other man so he could rest his chin just above Dom’s shoulder.

“When?” Dom sounded almost sullen, but Billy pressed on.

“Do you remember the angels?” He barely moved his mouth, his throat entirely still, the words coming out as air, breath less than a whisper, barely ghosting past Dom’s ear. Dom’s shoulders stiffened, then relaxed against him, and Billy knew that Dom had heard.

“This.” Dom paused, letting the word take on weight. “This was like that? Like that day?”

Billy worked his way deeper into the blankets without loosing his hold on Dom.

“Something like that. But then again, we have days like that one all the time.” He smiled against the back of Dom’s neck, pressing the curve of his lips there. Dom still felt hot from the sun, still radiating back the heat he’d absorbed during the day, and Billy wondered briefly if he had a burn there.

“Do we?” Dom sounded almost scared, as if he had been missing something obvious and it could hurt him somehow.

Billy shifted his arms, crossing them over Dom’s chest and holding him almost too tight, stilling his breath for a moment as he flexed his arms. In that instant of silence he held his own breath, listening for something, then gave up when they breathed in at the same time, his arms relaxing. In only moments they were asleep, lulled by the ordinary mechanical drone of the air conditioner.

 

It wasn’t unusual for them to wake with Chloe in their bed, either curled up on the pillows or sprawled along the end of the mattress, especially when they were away from home, but in the thin light through the sheer curtains her slight features looked almost too perfect, her skin untouched by creases or the flush of sleep, and Dom reached out one hand to push back her curls, as much to make sure she was real as to see if she was near waking. She shifted slightly where she had wedged herself between them, and lifted a fist to her mouth, resting the knuckle of her thumb against her lips. The illusion that she was something mysterious vanished, replaced by her true appearance—beautiful, certainly, but also ordinary, all baby fat and round cheeks and fussing a bit to get her place back.

“Morning.” Billy woke as she kicked him in the chest, oblivious to the two adults who happened to be where she was sleeping.

“Did the princess wake you up?”

“Quite.” Billy sat up, rubbing at his sternum. Chloe immediately rolled into the warm spot he’d left, and he chuckled at her audacity, sitting up against the headboard and reaching for Dom. “Sleep well?”

“I did.” Dom seemed on the verge of saying more when Billy found his hand beneath the covers, grasping and pulling it up in to the cooler air. Dom glanced at the alarm clock. Despite the sun it was still hours before Billy was needed on set, so he relaxed a bit. “About last night,” he said, beginning but not finishing his thought.

“Yes?” Billy traced his thumb across the back of Dom’s hand, but didn’t find the words for him.

“What happened?”

“Nothing that doesn’t happen all the time.” Billy tugged on Dom’s hand, and smiled when Dom instinctively tugged back. “We just don’t usually see it, I’d wager.”

“You’ve seen it before?”

Billy shook his head. “Might never see it again.” He kissed Dom’s hand, then slid out of bed, walking to the wall to turn down the air conditioner. Dom left the blankets more reluctantly, pulling them up over Chloe’s shoulders.

“What does it mean that we did see it?” He followed Billy into the kitchenette, scratching at his chin.

Billy shrugged as he ran the water in the sink, wasting several seconds worth to get the metallic taste from the pipes out, then filled the coffee pot. “Who knows? It’s a good thing, right?” He turned once he had finished measuring out the grounds, then walked to Dom, seeing as how he hadn’t left the middle of the tiny room. He patted Dom’s back gently, encouraged him to walk out of the room.

“People might see this stuff all the time,” Billy commented from where he leaned against the sink, his voice raised so Dom could hear him over the sound of the shower. The door was open, given that Chloe might wake any moment and come looking for them. He thought of the coffee brewing in the kitchen, kept his ear tuned for the sound of a chair being pushed across linoleum to the counter, the only way she would be able to reach it. Still, there was no reason to think that she’d seek mischief before her parents, especially if she could hear their voices.

“People who get locked up,” Dom said, washing his face. Life seemed simpler when surrounded by steam and hot water and clean smelling soap. If only it wasn’t for Billy remembering everything he did, he might have been able to write it all off in the name of dreams.

“Only if they talk about it,” Billy said, “and maybe then only if they insist on it.”

“So what is it?” Dom sounded almost annoyed, his thoughts combined with the concentration it took not to get shampoo in his eyes.

Billy shrugged, forgetting that Dom couldn’t see him, then placed the entire conversation to the back of his mind when he heard the creak of the bed, the soft thump of Chloe lowering herself to the ground, the sound of her footsteps as she followed the sounds to the open door and stood there in the steam, rubbing her eyes.

 

 

The first day that he woke up in his own bed again Dom woke to the sound of rain on the window. Rolling over he saw that Billy was awake too, staring at him in fact.

“Quite the trip,” Dom said, reaching out to him.

“It was.” Billy smoothed his hands over Dom’s, still too tired even after a night of jetlagged sleep for anything else.

“Did you see anything else?” Dom’s fingers pressed against the back of Billy’s hands when he spoke then, giving his words extra weight.

Billy’s brows furrowed, then straightened again once he understood the secret message in Dom’s hands, the connotation those words had now.

“Nothing else love.” He woke more when he spoke, sliding his hands up Dom’s wrists, inching closer.

“Nothing?” Dom said, slipping an arm behind Billy’s back, dragging his thumbnail down the middle of Billy’s spine. “No more magic?”

Billy smiled at that, another quick flash of teeth looking wet and predatory, almost sharp, but Dom didn’t back away. “I wouldn’t say that, Dom,” Billy said softly, his mouth softening when he spoke to a shape Dom recognized more readily. They leaned together to kiss, Billy’s lips and teeth no more or less against his than any other day, and when they’d stopped rolling and rocking together in the blankets Billy was on top of him, hip to hip and so his face a little lower than Dom’s.

Billy pushed himself up, hands on the mattress holding him above Dom so he could still look down at his face. “What do you call this?”

A gust of wind sent a sheet of rain against the window with a sound that was at once startling and comforting. Dom felt the thick familiar line of Billy’s erection pressing into his abdomen, that flesh just a shade warmer than his own, reached up to grasp Billy’s arse in his hands, bowing his body up just slightly as he did.

“I’d call this sex,” he said, his mouth curving at the ridiculous question.

“Ah hmmm.” Billy looked thoughtful, even while he pressed closer, rolled his weight from side to side, rubbing Dom’s cock with the flat inside edge of his hip. “And tell me. Do you want me?”

Dom almost laughed but was stopped by a particularly vigorous roll, stopped by the feeling of Billy leaning to one side as he reached down between them to run his fingers teasingly over the loose skin of Dom’s balls.

“Of course.”

Billy’s eyes narrowed as his fingers stilled, as if his entire person was being given over to thought. “Where do you feel it?”

Dom didn’t have to think, just took a hand from where he’d been clutching Billy’s arse, made a fist, pressed it just below his sternum. That was where it was, a pressure, demanding yet comforting in its confidence of being fulfilled.

“So you do feel it.” Billy smiled again as he took his hand back, leaning on the mattress again, resuming the slow rock back and forth. “And what possible explanation for that could there be? We’re two men, Dominic, and yet there’s that want that you feel, it’s not nature, it makes no sense, and yet we’re allowed to be together.”

“It is nature,” Dom insisted, grasping Billy’s arse, pulling him closer.

“It might be natural,” Billy countered, sliding his hands on the sheets until he had lowered himself completely to Dom’s chest, “but it’s not nature.” He curled his hands up over Dom’s shoulders. “Nature looks out for her own. And we’re doing nothing for her.”

 _Doesn’t feel like nothing,_ Dom thought of saying, but that was the moment when Billy found the right rhythm, the right rock and press and slide that got both of them to close their eyes and hold tight, moving together, neither opening their eyes to the light until after they’d stopped shuddering.

Billy planted a small kiss on Dom’s forehead.

Dom smiled, fully aware that his mouth was quirking to one side. “That I might call magic.”

“Why?” Billy slid off to one side, still covering Dom with an arm and a leg, pressed against his side now.

“Getting to finish without being interrupted.”

Billy smirked at the closed door. “Tell me about it.”

“But really. The other things.” Dom pulled the covers over them, not caring that the duvet would be covered in white splotches. “Should we even speak of them?”

Billy shrugged as he snuggled under the warm blanket, his whole body wriggling for a moment against Dom. “Why not?” He smiled up at Dom. “I’m not going to be calling you crazy anytime soon.”

“Other people.” It was a sentence in itself, and Dom stopped, waiting for Billy again.

“It doesn’t come up in conversation much. And when it did, it would be with someone who wouldn’t fear what you had to say.”

They had the thought almost at the same time, speaking in unison.

“Viggo.”

Billy held on to Dom’s waist while Dom leaned back to open the curtain. “I don’t think I like secrets,” Dom mused while he searched for the right pull on the side of the window. “They don’t feel right.”

“I agree.” Billy thought of their friends’ houses, bottles of wine and candlelight and getting a buzz on after the kids were asleep, and wondered if there was anything that couldn’t be said at those times.

Dom found the pull, yanked the curtain open, and jumped at the unusual sight, a line of large birds on the windowsill, huddling under the eaves.

“And yet here it is,” Billy said, looking out at them. “Seven blackbirds.” But his mouth was twisted slightly to one side, a sure sign that he wasn’t taking himself seriously.

“There are,” Dom said. “Were you expecting them?” He glanced at Billy, wondering if in fact Billy had been seeing things all along, now that he was expecting the animals to come to call.

“Not at all.” Billy rolled closer, so they were both lying on their stomachs, their faces looking at the window. The birds ruffled their wings but did not fly away at the motion, didn’t flinch as Billy slowly reached towards the glass. “But there’s seven for a secret.” He glanced at Dom, who shrugged. “One for sorrow, two for joy, three for a girl and four for a boy, five for silver, six for gold, seven for a secret, never to be told.” He laid his hand on the glass, waiting for the birds to move in fear, but none did. “You never heard that?”

Dom shook his head. “Never did.”

Billy slapped his palm against the window. There was a great fluttering of birds, wings fluttering, feet scraping on the brick ledge and thin black legs being folded into the soft underbelly of the birds’ bodies, but when the commotion had stilled there were still three birds, clinging to the sill, settling their feet with tiny steps and motions of their wings that were like women adjusting the skirts of their gowns.

“Three,” Dom said thoughtfully, “you don’t suppose.” He turned his head, looking over his shoulder towards the door, just in time to hear the knock, and see the knob turning before the knock could be answered.

“Come in,” Billy said wryly, turning over and pulling the blankets more evenly around them as they both sat up against the headboard.

“You’re supposed to wait until the person answers you,” Dom added, but it was too early in the morning, the bed too warm and comfortable, and her smile too sweet when she stepped into the room for him to press the point.

“Wanted to come in,” she said, enunciating her words almost as if she was chewing on them, her tiny white teeth flashing, her voice when speaking in full sentences still too new to discern whether she was going to pick up Billy’s or Dom’s accent more.

“I can see that.” Dom watched as she walked to the end of their bed, then climbed up, using only her right arm to steady herself. “Chloe,” he said, leaning forward, “what is wrong with your other hand?”

“Nothing.” She scooted across the duvet until she was between them, clearly hiding something in her left hand.

“Christ!” Whatever it was, Billy jumped away, leaning towards the wall when she came near enough for him to see. “Chloe, you know you’re not supposed to be in her tank.”

“She wanted to see you too.” She turned to Dom, all sweet smile and bright eyes. Clearly she’d been awake for longer than was good for her to be wandering about the house.

Dom reached over her shoulder, gently pulled her left arm to her front, where he could see it. As Billy’s reaction might have suggested, Nalia the albino snake was curled, quite happily it would seem, about Chloe’s wrist, her flat diamond shaped head fitting into the web between her thumb and palm.

“How did you get Nalia out of her tank?” Dom asked, still holding her arm.

“A chair.” The smile had faded from her face, but her chagrin was nothing to her fathers’, both of whom were imaging what she might have been up to, imaging a glass tank falling on a clumsy girl.

“You know that when you leave your room in the morning you are to tell us where you are,” Dom said, letting her arm go.

“Wanted to surprise you.” She said the “r” in surprise clearly, and even in his moment of fear and irritation Dom wondered if he’d ever heard her say that word before, wondered where she’d picked up that bit of Queen’s English.

“Well you did.” He bit back a smile as she brought her right hand up to Nalia’s head, gently stroking the snake between the eyes. “And you won’t do it again.”

She shook her head, then, looking down at the snake instead of at him. “Nalia wanted to see you too.”

“How do you know that?” Out of the corner of his eye Dom could see Billy reaching for his pajama pants.

“She told me.”

Dom glanced at Billy, who still looked irritated by the entire thing. “No. Not a chance,” Billy said, still leaning away from the snake.

Chloe turned at that, in time to see him pull the pajamas beneath the covers.

“You’re coming with me,” Billy said to her, “to put that little salmonella vector back where she belongs.”

Chloe stood then, running across the bed, nearly scuttling, really, and hopped off the edge to the floor where she stood waiting for Billy.

She shrieked delightedly when he threw his portion of the covers over on to Dom, sliding to the end of the bed before he stood. “You were naked under there!” she crowed.

“Indeed I was, until a little gypsy decided to frighten me out of my wits with a snake at seven in the morning.” He grasped the top of her head in his hand, flattening her runaway curls, and rolled his eyes back at Dom as if to say thought we were all done with that phase.

“I’m the gypsy,” Dom could hear her say as she and Billy left, walking towards the small office where Dom was allowed to keep his pets.

“That’s right.” Billy spoke around a yawn and Dom turned over again, not at all surprised to see the three blackbirds still staring in the window, their heads turned so that all he saw of each of them was a profile, one intelligent looking eye and a sharp beak. He slapped his hand against the glass as Billy had, nearly closing his eyes at the flutter of wings and feet that seemed so near. A laugh rose in his throat when he saw that two remained after all that; he lifted his hand, and they both flew away in a single instant.


End file.
